Here’s What Spartan Will Look Like on Windows 10 Phone

It’s not clear how it got out, but out it is: images of Microsoft’s new web browser, Spartan, have leaked onto the web courtesy of Polish tech forum WindowsMania. Specifically, these are images of Spartan running on Windows 10 Phone. Or Windows 10 Mobile. Or Windows Phone 10…or something. I don’t know what they’re going to call it, but it’s Windows 10, it’s Spartan, and it’s on a phone, okay? Okay.

A post on Neowin helpfully parses what the screens reveal: features like the Hub and the reading list are new twists on older ideas. The Hub seems to be where users can scope out their browsing history, bookmarks, and the aforementioned reading list. That’ll be a baked-in offline reader, so if you want to read content while you’re disconnected from the Internet, you’ll be able to save pages you come across as you browse. Most web browsers require add-ons or extensions for that, so the fact that it’ll be built right into Spartan is pretty interesting.

There’s also an image featuring some kind of Cortana functionality, though what form that takes isn’t entirely apparent at the moment. But overall, Spartan seems like a clean and functional browser, at least from these small, static glimpses.

While I know that it’ll be the default browser in Windows 10, will Spartan also appear on other non-Windows platforms? I like Chrome a bunch, but I don’t love it. I’d be more than happy to switch over to a different browser if it can do everything Chrome does—but better. So far, the Hub and its offline reading sound like a great addition. If I can get Spartan on my Android smartphone, maybe I’ll say goodbye to Chrome for good.

[Source: WindowsMania via Neowin]